


once in a lifetime, you were mine.

by angelica_barnes



Series: ABC [5]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Love, M/M, Nightmares, Quote: I'm with you 'til the end of the line, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-29
Updated: 2018-09-29
Packaged: 2019-07-20 06:06:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,118
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16131215
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angelica_barnes/pseuds/angelica_barnes
Summary: it's not the ending that matters, but what happens in the quiet moments when nobody's watching.happiness isn't something they can take for granted.5. ending





	once in a lifetime, you were mine.

**Author's Note:**

> title and lyrics taken from "Once In A Lifetime" by One Direction

 

**“He’s the one my heart was made for.”**

  
**\- David Levithan**

 

Their first kiss happens at one in the morning on a Sunday, while Bucky’s out drinking and Steve’s praying in their bedroom, and the former comes home smelling of booze and sex and Steve pushes back the tears, whispers, “Fuck it,” under his breath and kisses his best friend, pretending the pitch black and open windows aren’t ever gonna matter.

He squeezes his eyes shut, stiffens his body for the moment Bucky realizes that he’s not kissing some dame, that they’re sinning and pushes him away, but Bucky’s arms come around the body he knows so well and Steve hears Bucky’s pleading rasp, “Stevie.”

The night ends with them curled in each other’s arms in bed, only fifteen and sixteen, and Bucky’s the first to whisper, “I love you,” into the dark, lips pressed against the shell of Steve’s ear.

Steve whispers it back and wonders how many years it’ll be before somebody makes him regret it.

 

**once in a lifetime it’s just right and we make no mistakes**

 

The draft letter comes, Steve grows, Peggy Carter comes into the picture and still, as soon as Bucky’s eyes refocus in Azzano, he’s crying out Steve’s name and kissing him, pretending that they have more time than just five minutes. (Then again, neither of them ever thought they’d still be here now.)

They walk back together, hands clasped together and hidden between them, but when they arrive back at camp, Peggy’s there, smiling, and Bucky feels himself slipping, losing grip.

But then Steve looks over at him and smiles, and Bucky knows then that they’re past the point where they could reasonably stop this and pretend it won’t kill them.

 

**not even a landslide or riptide could take it all away**

 

Steve seems to realize it soon after, as he comes back to the tent later, where Bucky’s lying down, facing the wall and trying to remember what it felt like to hold little Stevie in his arms so he has something to keep for when Steve lets him go.

Steve reaches over, takes Bucky’s hand, and pulls him up into a simple slow dance. Bucky rests his head on Steve’s chest, closes his eyes, and pretends it’s gonna last.

“I love you,” Steve whispers, in the lantern light, lips pressed against the shell of Bucky’s ear, and Bucky believes him.

 

**somehow, it feels like nothing has changed**

**right now, my heart is beating the same**

 

Steve’s vision blurs with the tears and the wind, freezing him into silence, but he manages to shout out of something like desperation, “Bucky!”

 

**out loud, someone’s calling my name**

 

Bucky looks up and reaches for him, the bar breaks and he’s falling, falling, until he’s gone.

 

**it sounds like you**

 

Steve wakes up seventy years later screaming Bucky’s name.

 

**when I close my eyes**

 

He keeps waiting for someone to put him down, to detain him, but all he finds are a bunch of spies wanting him to help save the world, again.

He pushes aside the sharp stabbing feeling in his gut, steels his heart from doing anything but beating, and nods.

For the first time seventy-one years, he can’t breathe. He doesn’t want to.

 

**all the stars align**

**and you are by my side**

**you are by my side**

 

He doesn’t dream the night before he meets the Winter Soldier. He wonders which tortured, twisted soul lies behind the mask, and then, as he sees those blue eyes made of the broken shards of glass of a mirror, wonders if it matters.

All he sees is his reflection, anyway. As if his greatest enemy is himself.

And then after years, years and years of not saying anything about it, not to Sam, not to Natasha, not to anyone…

“Bucky?”

But Steve can tell this man doesn’t know him, from the way his eyes grow cold with pain and the orders that cause it, mouth set in a hard line with no hint of the grin that used to play there.

“Who the hell is Bucky?” The man spits, and brings to life all of Steve’s worst fears.

 

**once in a lifetime it’s just right and we are always safe**

**not even the bad guys in the dark night could take it all away**

 

The air is burning, his body is burning, his heart is burning, and he wants to die with the truth on his lips and love in his eyes.

So he whispers, “I’m with you til the end a the line.”

And waits for the fatal blow that never comes.

Bucky stares, eyes flickering with recognition, lips moving uncontrollably to form the words back, and Steve hears him through the ringing in his ears.

“Stevie?”

This time, it’s Steve who falls.

He doesn’t even care.

 

**somehow, it feels like nothing has changed**

**right now, my heart is beating the same**

 

But Bucky’s a better man than him. A braver one.

And he follows.

 

**out loud, someone’s calling my name**

 

Steve wakes up in the hospital and as soon as he’s out, starts preparing to chase his reason to live, even if that reason only wants him to survive.

“I need to find him,” he tells Sam, clawing at the ground and muttering hoarsely. “I need to find him, however long it takes, however many people, however many… I need to find him.”

Sam forces him to sleep, and there are the dreams.

Somehow it’s so much worse than before.

 

**and it sounds like you**

 

“Bucky!”  
“Aaahhhhhhhh!”

 

**when I close my eyes**

 

He opens his eyes.

“Bucky?”

“Who the hell is Bucky?”

 

**all the stars align**

 

Two years and he finds him, kisses him right as the walls come crumbling down and the ceiling caves in, floor disappearing beneath their feet.

He defends him, shooting down anyone’s sound advice, in favor of going mad to the mixtape of random mutterings in his head -

“It’s not your fault.”

“He’s not the kind you save.”

“Aaaaaaahhhhh!”

Bucky’s kisses drown it out until the ice comes down on them again, this time around Bucky and nestled in the fractures unrepaired of Steve’s heart.

 

**and you are by my side**

 

He closes his eyes.

 

**you are by my side, you are by my side**

 

Bucky opens his.

 

**you are by my side**

 

They meet in the middle, hands tangled, no need to touch anywhere else. They’re the dust between each other’s fingers, the sands of time poured down each other’s throats, the reason to live and breathe and love in an era of chaos, death, and hate.

The sky blackens.

Steve closes his eyes, and breathes.

 

**once in a lifetime you were mine.**

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> hope you enjoyed! ;)


End file.
